


she seeks the stars (and spirals up their stairs)

by Cinaed



Category: Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Character Study, F/M, Female Friendship, Grief/Mourning, Het
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-29
Updated: 2010-08-29
Packaged: 2017-10-11 08:13:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/110282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cinaed/pseuds/Cinaed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Daleks have ravaged and ruined this planet-- not beyond repair, of course, or beyond humanity's endurance. But Susan does not know her place here, an alien on a broken world. (Doctor Who, Susan Foreman and Jenny gen, initial Susan/David)</p>
            </blockquote>





	she seeks the stars (and spirals up their stairs)

**Author's Note:**

> While this was originally started for femgenficathon 2010, I didn't finish it in time. However, now that I've completed it, I thought I'd post it anyway. Thanks go out to schlicky for beta-reading this for me!
> 
> The title comes from "She Lives in a Time of Her Own" by the 13th Floor Elevators.
> 
> The quotation that inspired the story was:
> 
>  
> 
> _By the time we are women, fear is as familiar to us as air; it is our element. We live in it, we inhale it, we exhale it, and most of the time we do not even notice it. Instead of "I am afraid," we say, "I don't want to," or "I don't know how," or "I can't."_ \-- Andrea Dworkin (1946-2005), American radical feminist and author.

"You knew you could never leave him," David murmurs, but the words sound faint, as though he's speaking to her from a distance. She cannot feel his breath against her skin, or the warmth of his body as he holds her. 

Later, Susan will recognize this as shock. Her hearts pound sharp and unsteady in her ears, all too quick beats that makes something in her chest flutter. This is how your hearts break, she thinks, with a wrenching pain in your chest and a thousand words dying unsaid on your lips.  

_Grandfather, _she wants to say-- scream, perhaps, loudly enough that he will hear her wherever he is in time and space. _Grandfather._ She closes her eyes instead, leans heavily into David's touch, the space around her neck where the TARDIS key used to be feeling wrong, wrong, wrong. _Grandfather. _The name echoes hopelessly in her mind. Her ears strain for the sound of the TARDIS returning, but there is only silence and her own desperate thoughts. 

  
_Grandfather, don't leave me here. Grandfather, come back. Grandfather_. 

"Susan," David says, and then, "Susan, please, say something," when she doesn't answer him. 

Barbara had told her a fairy-tale once, about a girl who gave up her voice so she could be with the man she loved. When Susan tries to speak, nothing comes out but a soundless exhale. Perhaps she has bargained away her hearts and her voice without knowing.

Time has gone all wibbly-wobbly on her, she thinks, because when she finally coaxes her voice back, the sky is beginning to darken. The sun dips below the horizon as she opens her eyes, uncertain of when exactly she closed them, or how long she and David have been standing here. 

"David," she says. Her face is wet, she realizes, and her lips sting and taste of salt. "Can we...?" 

She trails off, not because her voice has fled again, but because she has no idea what to do now. The Daleks have ravaged and ruined this planet-- not beyond repair, of course, or beyond humanity's endurance. But she does not know her place here, an alien on a broken world. 

"Let's go home," David says gently, arms still around her and his eyes fixed earnest and concerned upon her face. 

Home. Was it only a few hours ago she had told him she had no home, no place, no purpose? Now her home is Earth, her purpose.... Well. As for her purpose, she supposes she will see. 

"Let's go home," Susan echoes, and the final word only hurts a little. 

 

* * *

 

  
They get two blocks away before Susan's hearts begin to pound again in her ears and she cannot breathe. Her hand gropes for her throat, fingers searching for a chain that isn't there. The key, she realizes. Grandfather will be so angry when he returns and learns she's lost the key. 

David runs back for it. When he presses the key into her hand, the tears spill over once more. 

 

 

* * *

 

David's home is a small patch of farmland that used to belong to his father's family before the plague and the invasion. When he tells her that the land is now his, he does so in a quiet, matter-of-fact way that belies the weariness in his eyes. 

Susan doesn't press him for more information because she knows what isn't being said-- his family is gone. She can recognize loss-- it is all she can see whenever she sees her reflection now, hollow-eyed and haunted.

Working the soil eases a tension in David's shoulders, brushes away some of the lines of strain on his face. David will be happy here, she knows, creating something out of soil, water, and seed. She loves him all the more for it, his endless patience and his love of creation. 

She loves him, so she doesn't tell him how much she hates that small patch of land, the fields overgrown with weeds, vines covering the walls of the farmhouse. She hates the calluses on her hands, and the way the dirt feels under her fingernails. She hates how she cannot tell a vegetable from a weed and how useless she is in the fields. Most of all, she hates how every sound makes her clutch at the key around her neck and look for the TARDIS. 

She doesn't tell him, but perhaps she doesn't hide her feelings as well as she should, because after three months of this, David puts a hand on the small of her back as she prepares dinner and says softly, "Susan, we should talk." 

"Talk? What about?" Susan repeats, hearing the words come out too bright and brittle. When she turns her gaze away from the bubbling soup, his tender expression pierces her clear through.

"If you...." He pauses; she can feel his hand, warm through her shirt, tremble a little. "If you don't want to farm, we can go somewhere else." He doesn't meet her eyes as he says this, keeps his gaze fixed upon the wall, but his voice and body language are earnest. 

She loves him then, so much that it is physically painful. He would give up this place, his happiness, for her? "Oh," she says helplessly. "David--"

"We could go to one of the larger towns, maybe, or even London," he continues. 

Susan cannot listen to him give up his dreams for her any longer. She turns and presses a kiss against his sunburned cheek. "You belong here," she says, and watches his features soften with relief. 

He pulls her against him and kisses her forehead. "I love you," he whispers into her hair. 

"I love you too," she says. 

She leaves the next day. 

 

 

* * *

 

Jenny greets her with an absent smile and a hurried handshake on the steps of what was once a millionaire's mansion. Now it's a makeshift Parliament, where Jenny and the other hastily elected officials meet.  

"Sorry, I hate to do this, but we're in the middle of negotiating water rights," she explains. "Come on in and have a seat, and I'll show you around the city once I'm done, all right?" 

"All right," Susan says. She sits down and watches the debate over water rights continue. She can't make sense of most of it, but she grasps that there's a shortage of usable water-- sanitation had been badly damaged during the plague, and the Daleks ruined most of the rest of the water supplies during the occupation. 

Jenny is in the thick of things, shouting and waving her hands about and sometimes blistering the ears of her opponents. Susan admires her as she puts her hands on her hips and bellows into the face of someone being particularly obstinate. No wonder Jenny had gotten on so well with Barbara.

Susan leans back in her seat, and closes her eyes. If she tries, she can almost pretend Jenny and the older man she is arguing with are Barbara and Grandfather, disagreeing over the right to change history for the better. 

"Susan," Jenny says. From her tone, it is not the first time she has said Susan's name. 

She opens her eyes, which are prickling. She rubs at them absently, and feels dampness on the back of her hand. "Did I fall asleep?" 

"Yes," Jenny says. She is wearing a look Susan can't quite read. Concern, perhaps, or impatience with Susan's uselessness. Probably the latter, Susan thinks. All she brought with her from the farm are the clothes on her back and the TARDIS key. 

Jenny snaps her fingers. "Come on, then. I missed breakfast. We can grab a meal." She extends her hand, helps Susan to her feet. As they step outside and Susan squints against the sudden sunlight, Jenny asks, "Got any plans on what you'll do in London?"  

"I...don't know," Susan admits. All she knows is that she couldn't take another day of being miserable on the farm, and watching David be unhappy over her misery. She ducks her head, admits in a low voice, "I--I don't know much about this century. I don't know how much help I'll be." 

To her surprise, Jenny snorts. "You're not too much at a disadvantage there. About everyone from the age of twenty and younger are useless. The Daleks didn't exactly believe in educating their workforce." Bitterness coats her words, and she kicks savagely at a clump of dirt. 

Susan doesn't know what to say to that, so she just keeps walking, brushing shoulders with Jenny as they turn a corner. 

There is silence for a moment, and then Jenny ventures, unusually hesitant, "You traveled the stars, Barbara said." 

"I did," Susan says. It hurts to speak, her throat aching with a thousand griefs, but Jenny deserves an answer. "My grandfather and I wandered the universe for years." She still cannot look at the night sky without pain. She thinks, not for the first time, that she never will. She takes a deep breath. She can guess at what Jenny's hinting about. "I don't know much about technology, though. We stole the time machine, you see, and we were just...guessing as we went. I can't help with water sanitation or anything." 

Jenny smiles a little crookedly. "Was worth a shot." She shrugs, and then thinks. "Do you know English? The written language, I mean? You could help me with my paperwork. Or maybe you could do something else. Teach, maybe." 

"Teach?" Susan stares blankly at her, and then tries to imagine it. Standing in Barbara or Ian's place at the front of a class, telling her students about the time Grandfather had argued with Robespierre, or the time Marco Polo stole the TARDIS. The idea is so ridiculous, she laughs. "I would be a horrible teacher." 

Jenny frowns, stopping in the middle of the street and giving Susan a curious look. "Why?" 

"Why?" Susan laughs again. She tries to picture herself speaking with Barbara's enthusiasm and Ian's confidence, and knows she could never pull it off. If she stood in front of a group of students, she would only wind up making a fool of herself. "I-- Barbara and Ian have a gift. I don't." 

Jenny levels a look at her. "Why not give it a try? We've a short supply of teachers. If you do turn out horrible, we'll figure something else out." 

When Jenny keeps staring, Susan shakes her head. "All right," she says at last. Why not? At least it might make her feel less useless, this attempt at teaching. Worse comes to worse, she can work for Jenny instead. She fingers the key, and adds, "I suppose I could teach a few things about history."

"That's the spirit," Jenny says, and drapes an arm across her shoulders. "Now, let's have that meal. You're skin and bones." 

 

* * *

 

Some nights, Susan looks out at the stars and thinks, _Grandfather, where are you? _  


Some nights, Susan stands on her roof and yells, "Grandfather, I'm _waiting_! Come and get me!" until her throat is raw and she can barely speak in class the next morning.  

Some nights, Susan closes the curtains and doesn't think of the stars or the TARDIS or Grandfather at all. (Those nights are the worst.) 

Each year, she gets a new batch of students, some of whom have heard of her, some of whom haven't. They all look at her with mixed expressions of interest, boredom, and skepticism as she stands before them and introduces herself, one hand usually clasping the key resting at the base of her throat. 

"Hello, class. My name is Susan. Once, a long time ago, I traveled the stars." 


End file.
